Played solo (as usual..) Played within an hour.

Great short and small sized scenario. The Germans are fighting against time, a M16 and the entry odds. In setting up I totally forgot the hill an the south side of the board, so I put the 105mm (and leader) in the southeastern part of town to cover the road (and what I thought at the time, also the southeast of the board. Boy was I mistaken. I put the halftrack in the middle of the town, the infantry (with leader) up north in town and the trucks savely in the back but close enough to tow away the gun just in case. On turn 1 only one German unit with a Lt managed to get on the board, on turn 2 however, 3 more appeared. I decided to let them all enter on the south edge of the board, so I could make use of the LOS blocking hill. With the 4 units/2 leaders already on board in turn 3, with 2 more entering, I hurried towards the west staying out of sight. The Americans could not move, so seeing the errors of my ways, I couldn't tow away or support the vulnerable artillery pieces. Moreover, they were positioned adjacent to the hill and (assuming that the hill contour hex is also at +20) wouldn't be able to see the Germans until they were adjacent and even then I had positioned the other Allied so badly, that they couldn't even cover that with opportunity fire. Oh boy, oh boy..

What I feared happened indeed. The one front German unit was on top of the 105mm in no time. Due to the higher init (getting 2 impulses), the M16 could not react immediately. The assault however was too weak to take any effect. Moreover, to compensate for the sloppy Allied setup, I didn´t use my best leader (a 1-10-1 Lieutenant). He was with the second group of units and too far away to influence right now.. Now it was the M16's time to react and it entered the assault hex from adjacent. With a whopping 24 DF, it reduced the lonely Grenadier unit, but the other step did not break..

Turn 6 was for the Germans again with 3 impulses they could move all units before the Americans. The Germans immediately reinforced the assault hex with 2 extra Grenadier units initiating a second assault with 15 DF. Did I hear the halftrack commander say: Nuts!? Anyway the defenders seemed invulnerable to any fire. Their defense roll however was devastating. The Germans lost another 2 steps, with the leader demoralised and the other units disupted. The top German leader mentioned above, in the meantime occupied a town hex and captured a truck in doing so.

To be short, although the Germans supported the main assault hex in the following turns, the 105mm was never really threatened. Both sides lost 4 steps of infantry, the Americans were denied their victory conditions, but the Germans couldn't silence the gun. A Draw was the result.

Great learning scenario in which good tactics can make the day..